A weightless, sort of dispensable first-time feature by Menno Meyjes, is a portrait of Hitler in his youth as an art student.

Hitler, more or less, takes a back seat to a Jewish art exhibitor Max Rothman (a one-armed, chain-smoking, adulterating, upper-class vet), who in turn urges Hitler to open up and expand his style ó abandon the kitsch. Aside from Hitler similarly being swept up by all of the military propaganda and being recruited to deliver many of said speeches, there is little else to Max. If it simply is there to show of Hitler before the monster, yes, it can be done without demonizing him (though Noah Taylorís lisp makes Hitler more effete and wussy than should be), although there is little to be said of him during that period. Meyjes offers little as either a story or a portrait, causing one to wonder where his sense of the art form is.